A three-sphere swimmer for flagellar synchronization

Abstract

In a recent letter (Friedrich et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 109:138102, 2012), a minimal model swimmer was proposed that propels itself at low Reynolds numbers by a revolving motion of a pair of spheres. The motion of the two spheres can synchronize by virtue of a hydrodynamic coupling that depends on the motion of the swimmer, but is rather independent of direct hydrodynamic interactions. This novel synchronization mechanism could account for the synchronization of a pair of flagella, e.g. in the green algae Chlamydomonas. Here, we discuss in detail how swimming and synchronization depend on the geometry of the model swimmer and compute the swimmer design for optimal synchronization. Our analysis highlights the role of broken symmetries for swimming and synchronization.

25 pages, 4 color figures, provisionally accepted for publication in the New Journal of Physics

References in corpus (4)

• The hydrodynamics of swimming microorganisms
• A basic swimmer at low Reynolds number
• Synchronization of rotating helices by hydrodynamic interactions
• Hydrodynamic phase-locking of swimming microorganisms

Cited by in corpus (17)

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• The load-response of the flagellar beat
• Phase Dependent Forcing and Synchronization in the three-sphere model of Chlamydomonas
• Hydrodynamic synchronization of spontaneously beating filaments
• In-phase and anti-phase flagellar synchronization by basal coupling
• Hydrodynamic synchronization of flagellar oscillators
• Synchronization in cilia carpets: multiple metachronal waves are stable, but one wave dominates
• Synchronization in cilia carpets and the Kuramoto model with local coupling: breakup of global synchronization in the presence of noise
• Energetics of synchronization in coupled oscillators rotating on circular trajectories
• Optimal motion of triangular magnetocapillary swimmers
• A general perturbative approach for bead-based microswimmers reveals rich self-propulsion phenomena
• Load response of shape-changing microswimmers scales with their energy efficiency
• Reinforcement learning of a biflagellate model microswimmer
• Nonlinear dynamics and fluctuations in biological systems (Habilitation thesis)